AUGUSTA, Ga. — The roar that accompanied Mike Weir's hole in one at the par-three 16th in Tuesday's practice round was the loudest noise heard all day at Augusta National. But he looked a little embarrassed talking about it later.

"I got a mulligan hole in one," he said. "I was trying to hit a cut five-iron with the first one and it just went straight." So he took another ball out, re-teed and ... "I cut it in there and it went right in the hole. It was kind of cool, because from that (middle left) pin you can just watch it and see it go right in."

That's how many aces, in his golfing life?

"If you count that one, that would be 10, but I'm not counting that one," he said. It was the first time he'd ever holed out a tee shot at Augusta, but strictly speaking, even if he could get away with calling his second ball a provisional, he'd have made a three on the hole.

For his playing partner on the day, Weyburn's Graham DeLaet, the explosion of noise was a taste of what it can be like around that part of the course on a Masters weekend.

"It was an electric feeling ... it got a smile out of us, for sure," he said. "Something special always seems to happen down the stretch here. Hopefully, I can be the guy."

• • •

DeLaet's beard is starting to look a little mountain-mannish. He had told his buddies in "Graham's Gangsters" — the group of eight friends who followed him around in garish green-and-yellow T-shirts — that he wasn't going to shave it until he won a PGA Tour event, but they say he's been cheating. He keeps it trimmed.

He also may be waffling on keeping it or not.

"It's been fun. I hear people kind of chanting 'Beard!’ ” There's no real set timeline for it," DeLaet said.

The Gangsters are all holed up in a house arranged for them by DeLaet's (and Weir's) agents at SportBox. He spends a little time with them each day, but the Gang is partying fairly hard, and was up playing cribbage until nearly 7 a.m. Monday night, so the eyes were a little red when Weir and DeLaet teed off at 10:25.

"I double-skunked him at crib yesterday," said Lee Fairbairn, a salesman for a steel company in Saskatoon.

"I had one bad game," DeLaet protested.

He says his own rented house is about three miles away from the Gang's.

"I can't party with those guys even on a good day," he said. "They're here having a great time. At the same time I've got to make sure that I'm doing the right things. Not avoiding them, but going over and maybe have a beer or something in the mid-afternoon. But stick to my routine and make sure I get a good night's sleep."

• • •

As befits a Swede with a quirky sense of humour, Henrik Stenson had his own take on the value of experience at the Masters.

"Yeah, when you come here the first time, you still think that it's a good idea to hit a nice little draw left of the bunker on No. 2," he said. "But then you overturn it and it goes in the pine needles and ends up in the creek, you realize that wasn't the case.

"It's a course that I think you need normally to play a few times to get the hang of, and you've got to make a few mistakes. Even if someone else tells you that it's not a good idea to miss it left until you're actually standing down there dropping in the trees. It's a bit like when your parents told you not to do stuff and you still did it, right?"

• • •

Stenson, who won last year's FedEx Cup and its $10-million bonus, hasn't had anything like as spectacular a start to his 2014 season, but says his game is "in decent shape. I think you always feel like when you're coming to a big tournament like this one, you always want to play a little bit better and be a little bit more prepared. But we are in decent shape. Putting has been a little bit off maybe the last couple of weeks. But that doesn't matter, because you don't need to putt well around Augusta, right?"

That drew a big laugh in the interview room.

• • •

Aussie Jason Day, who won this year's WGC Accenture Match Play, says it's no accident young players are more fearless now.

"Times have changed," he said. "These days, kids have a mental coach, strength coach, swing coach, maybe a short-game coach. I mean, they have so many people around them that are there in place to make sure that they are improving and competing and playing well.

"Kids these days, they are coming out confident. They are coming out stronger, faster. Their game is a lot tighter and every year that goes by, they are just coming out tougher to compete and play against."

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